There’s nothing like locking a couple away in a confined space with peril looming over them to get their issues out on the table. Meanwhile the mystery gets deeper and wider, as we encounter some intriguing consequences of uncovering the Big Bad’s skeletons (and yes I mean that literally). Turns out she’s no small-beans soul-eater, on the hook for a couple of unsolved murders. That was just the beginning.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

EPISODE 7 RECAP

Eun-oh discovers the black talismans that once sealed the mass grave, and starts to lay them out. There are characters he recognizes: North, South, East, West. He arranges them following the cardinal directions, and then wonders if maybe there are more pieces to this puzzle…

He runs through the forest, following northwest, southwest, northeast, and finds these corners marked with talismans hanging on trees. He grabs them one by one and puts them down with the others.

Mom senses a mystical disturbance. She does not look happy.

There’s definitely something powerful going on, because the kings of heaven and hell watch as a little crystal ball begins to crack…

Eun-oh has one more piece left, and heads southeast. He finds the last talisman, hanging from a tree that’s hanging over the edge of a cliff. Uh, I don’t like the look of this. He inches forward, balancing precariously on the trunk of the tree.

The Bangs happen to be on his tail, and the particularly murderous Bang decides that this is the best opportunity—all they need to do is push, and they don’t even get any blood on their hands.

They argue over who should to do the pushing. Shouldn’t the guy with the murderous ideas have to put his money where his mouth is? But somehow, leader Lee Bang draws the short straw or loses at rock-paper-scissors, because he’s creeping up behind Eun-oh with a terrified look.

Eun-oh reaches, and reaches… and Lee Bang closes his eyes and reaches his hands out…

But he can’t even bring himself to make contact, and just stands there reaching out for Eun-oh’s ass. Please fall backward.

Eun-oh inches closer and finally yanks the talisman from its branch… and then loses his balance and goes tumbling down the cliff. Aaaaaaaah!

As the last talisman comes off, Mom’s power wanes and she trembles, doubling over in a pained cry. She looks up at the heavens, “Has it finally begun?”

And up in the clouds, the kings watch as the crystal ball shatters and a light escapes. And inside we see a view of the mass grave. Hm, I wonder what it is. It can’t be their souls, if she ate them…

The Jade Emperor says it’s finally been uncovered. He sends Mu-young to go down and see if there are any traces left, and muses that the baddie will be scrambling now that they’ve uncovered the thing she’s been struggling so hard to keep hidden.

He turns to Hades, “Aren’t humans useful sometimes?” Hades begrudgingly admits that “the child” has some use. I wonder if he means Eun-oh or Arang. Jade Emperor just smirks to himself like the impish god that he is.

Down below, the Bangs rush to Lee Bang’s side to say he did it, and he swears up and down that he didn’t. I love how they’re like, Yes! Exactly! You didn’t do it! *wink wink* And they drag him away, protesting and screaming that he didn’t do it.

Arang’s voice rings through the forest, calling out for the magistrate. And then Mu-young arrives and stops at the edge of the cliff where Eun-oh fell, but he just keeps going. Should I take that as a good sign? You kinda don’t want the grim reaper to be the guy visiting you after a fall like that.

Arang calls out for Eun-oh at the grave, and then jumps to see Mu-young looming behind her. Dude. Can we maybe get him a collar with a bell?

She remembers she needn’t be afraid of him, though it’s clear she still is, and she asks if he’s still following her around, acting annoyed. She starts to remind him about her deal, but he just walks right past her, through the rope, and towards the grave.

She sighs in relief and then continues her search for Eun-oh. Mu-young crouches down and puts his hand on a talisman, and feels something…

He furrows his brow, “Mu-yeon… it can’t be you?” Ooooh, is this the missing sister? Aw poor Mu-young. I hope he doesn’t end up having to hunt his only sister!

Arang calls out for Eun-oh over and over, and gets no response. But she spots something near the tree where he fell…

Joo-wal goes to see Mom (he calls her Wife as does his father, but I find it’s easier to just think of her as Eun-oh’s mom). She points her finger at him and screams in a rage, “YOU! This is all because of you!”

He falls to his knees to beg for forgiveness, and says he killed her, he swears. He checked to make sure she was dead. But he didn’t know she’d come alive again and walk right out. Mom’s eyes grow wide, “What did you say?”

It dawns on her that these events must be connected. She says over and over, “She’s alive? You killed her, and she’s alive…”

Arang peers over the ledge and finds Eun-oh lying on another ledge, halfway down. He’s bloody and unconscious. She scrambles back to the gravesite and starts untying the rope, and calls out to Mu-young for help. I wonder if the grim reaper is capable of saving a life—does that negate his entire existence, or just make him a rebel? But we don’t find out, because he turns his back and walks away.

She races back to the cliff and ties the rope to the tree, and braces herself before rappelling down, mostly with her eyes closed, terrified she’ll fall.

She gets close, but then loses her footing and the rope breaks, sending her careening past Eun-oh’s ledge. Eeeeep!

But suddenly a bloody arm reaches out and catches her. Eun-oh screams from the pain, using his bloodied broken arm to hold her, and has the time to joke, “Are you here to save me or to kill me?” Ha.

He yanks her up with all his strength, and they both collapse in a heap. He says they both could’ve died, and then realizes wait… she can’t die… “Then I almost died alone for nothing!”

She hurriedly ties off his bloody arm, panicked that they have no way of getting out of here. He says there is one way… she could jump off the ledge and she’d die, but then come back to life, and she could go get help. Uh, that’s your big idea?

She looks down at the river far below, then back at Eun-oh, and closes her eyes, getting ready to jump. WUT. She leans forward… and he grabs her, “Are you crazy?”

He tells her it was a joke, but she’s too panicked to see straight. You know your gallows humor is dark if a ghost doesn’t think it’s funny. She asks what they’ll do then. He tells her he’ll think of something after a quick nap, which is a really bad idea…

She screams at him not to lose consciousness and shakes him, but he’s out. She looks around frantically, and then spots a crevice in the rocks behind her.

The Bangs drink to their denial, and Dol-swe comes around looking for Eun-oh. And then of all things, it starts to rain.

Thankfully that crevice turned out to be a tiny opening to a cave, and Arang pulls Eun-oh inside. They’re both covered in blood, and she tries to get him to wake up. She says she’ll be right back and warns, “If you die, you’re dead!”

She crawls through to find a rather large cave inside, and drags him all the way in. They’ve come in out of the rain, but of course it’s freezing in there, and Eun-oh starts to shiver from the cold.

Arang doesn’t know what else to do, so she lies down behind him and puts her arms around him to keep him warm. Aw. He asks what she’s doing and she says he’ll be warmer this way, and then wonders, “Should I have taken off my clothes?”

Rawr? He cracks a smile. Well that got his attention. But she decides, “No, I can’t bring myself to do that!” She asks if this is any warmer.

But he breaks the news to her that she has no warmth—literally, as in her ki has no heat. “Didn’t you know? This isn’t really the time or place to tell you, but you have quite the number of defects.” Ha.

She says that can’t be true of people… which is of course the alarming thing about it. She sits up and put her hands to her face, trying to feel the warmth. She says it feels normal, but he sighs. It must not be a difference she can feel.

It makes her heart sink, and she goes on a quest to find something to burn for a fire. Eun-oh just sighs that it would be better if she sat still, given her proclivity for accidents.

Once she’s alone, she mutters that there’s no such thing as a human without body heat, and says the Jade Emperor wouldn’t have made her so shabbily. And then she adds nervously, “Even though he left something out which makes me not die when I’m killed…. but still! I’m a person!”

She reaches the end of her trail at a big drop into a waterfall, and turns back. Just then, a shadowy figure approaches… Ack! A person? A ghost? It’s a man, and she backs up in fear, but he says he ran into the cave to avoid the rain, and seems harmless.

She brings him to Eun-oh, who asks if it’s still raining out there and the man says it’s really pouring. Arang asks if he has anything to start a fire with, and suddenly the man’s voice changes and he snaps that she’s being annoying. Uh…

He gets up and says he’s always prepared to start a fire. “I don’t like raw livers.” AAAAH! *shivers* Are you a gumiho? Wait, no… what are you?

He smiles, extra-creepy, and says he likes the cooked ones best, and then his other personality comes back and he slaps himself in the face. Uh, you’re crazy AND you eat livers?

He giggles in glee at the luck of chancing upon two livers at once, and Arang backs up, terrified. She asks what he is and he says he doesn’t know either, and backs her up against the wall and demands her liver.

He sniffs her and then licks his chops, “You have a really delicious liver… like a newborn baby’s… how is it possible?”

He opens his mouth, ready to take a bite, and she screams…

And Eun-oh drops the man with one thwack of his own walking stick. Nice. He’s barely standing, but he says he knew something was up when he showed up completely dry despite the rain. He points his finger at Arang, “See, you move and it’s an accident!”

Liver Man murmurs, “Do you know who I am?” Eun-oh says he doesn’t much care, and he can have her liver, but not his. He gathers up all his strength and socks him, and they both go down. He yells at her to run, but she refuses to go alone.

She pulls him up and they make a run for it, and she complains that he offered up her liver. He’s like, you’d just grow a new one! She’s not a starfish. Let’s not test her powers of regeneration with such vital organs.

But Liver Man isn’t down for the count, and comes back, pounding Eun-oh into the ground. He goes down bloody, and then the creepy creature goes for Arang’s delicious liver…

He reaches in, and then trembles in terror, “You’re not… human!” He looks at her closely and says she’s not a ghost either. She head-butts him and screams, “I AM a person!”

He shakes like a leaf and asks what she is, and she insists she’s human. But he gapes, “Are you… perhaps…” His eyes open wide. Omg, what? WHAT?

His fear turns into delight, as he realizes there might be something more valuable to eat than just her liver, and goes in for the kill… and suddenly stops. He turns, and there’s Mu-young. Woot! Are you here to save her?

Liver Man freaks out—what’s a reaper doing down here? How could he know about this place? Mu-young just silently draws his sword.

Arang asks what Crazy’s deal is, while he jabbers cryptically that if she’s really “that” then she’s in for big trouble. Before she can ask more questions, Mu-young slashes him with his sword, making a black cloud seep out.

He then draws him in with his soul-reaping stick, and all that’s left is a heap of clothes. Cool.

She gapes—what was he? He disappeared like a ghost, but he had a body. Mu-young says he was a soul, sealed away for centuries and twisted so that even he didn’t know what he was anymore.

Oh interesting. Is this what happened to all the souls in the mass grave? Maybe she doesn’t eat them, but harnesses their power, and now they’ve been freed?

Arang says she’s never heard of such a thing. How could a soul end up that way? Mu-young: “If you lose yourself, no matter what you are, ghost or not, you become a demon.”

She asks why someone would seal this place, and he says it’s not this place that was sealed. And then he disappears like mist, leaving her shouting after him with all her questions.

She runs over to Eun-oh and shakes him, “Are you dead? Are you dead?” He finally comes to and ekes, “Not… yet.”

Dol-swe waits and waits, and decides he can’t just stand here till the rain stops. He says even if his master dies he’ll die with him (lovable, but not the brightest bulb) and runs out in search of Eun-oh.

Mu-young returns to report to the kings that he found a demon. He calls it a result of the rift in the seal (Did the break literally cause the demon into existence or just free him?) and worries about what else is bound to show up. Count me excited. Yunno, in a creeped-out way.

Hades wonders how the baddie got to be so strong, and worries that perhaps it might even have developed the power to create demons to call forth at will. Whoa.

Jade Emperor says that might be true, but not to worry. “We have that child—our final weapon.” (It could also mean more pointedly, ultimate weapon. Innnnnnteresting.)

At least with the appearance of the Liver Demon, they have his clothes and stick to burn for a fire, and Arang sits with Eun-oh, asking what he would’ve done if she hadn’t found him. She nags that she’ll see how he treats her after saving his life.

He asks how her stab wound is, and she says it’s okay, more concerned with catching the bastard who stabbed her. “You’ll catch him too, right?” He says sure, and they’ll start with catching the guy who killed Seo-rim.

She lies down next to him and asks what he thinks it means, that when you lose yourself you become a demon. She figures he thinks all spirits are the same, evil or not. But she says there’s a big difference between ghosts and evil liver-eating spirits.

She swears that she’ll go to hell if she has to, but she’ll never become one of those. She rethinks it—she won’t go to hell or become a demon at all, and then finds that he’s already asleep.

She watches him sleep, remembering their first night together, and can’t help but smile. She says goodnight.

But then she asks one more thing—did Seo-rim’s fiancé come to her funeral? She was so frantic that she didn’t check, but she guesses that he must’ve. She sighs, wondering why she didn’t appear before him instead of Eun-oh, because then she wouldn’t be suffering like this.

“Good night. Don’t die!” Why so cute?

She wakes in the morning all alone and screams for Eun-oh. He comes hobbling out from one side of the cave, and says they need to find a way out. She says she’ll look that way, and he says sure, “but that side’s starting to collapse…”

The cave literally starts to cave in, and they end up back out on the ledge where they started. They argue about where to go from here, when a rope suddenly appears. It’s Dol-swe!

He sighs in relief that he found Eun-oh after searching all night, and then makes sure to scowl at Arang. Ha. Eun-oh tells her to climb up first, but Dol-swe actually yanks the rope back up, insisting that he will not let her go first. Pffft.

So Eun-oh goes up and then it’s Arang’s turn, and he keeps saying jinxy things like the ledge might collapse along with the cave, or that the rope might break…

But the rope is actually fraying with every pull, and I’m with Arang—stop jinxing it!

As he pulls her up with all his strength, still bleeding from his arm, he says that if the rope does break and she happens to fall, to just take a deep breath and it’ll be over in an instant. Eeep, stop saying it! But of course, because he friggin’ jinxed it, the rope snaps, and she falls.

Aaaaack, the fall makes my stomach lurch. He screams, “ARAAAAAAAANG!” as she falls backward all the way down…

And lands on a rock. She dies instantly, and then her body falls into the river. Eun-oh frantically gets up and starts running to her… and then collapses. Noooo! This is not the time to faint!

Mu-young reports the latest, and Hades asks angrily why the cave collapsed. Mu-young says it must’ve been the seal break, and all the escaping energy. Jade Emperor asks if he found any trace of the one they’re looking for, but nothing yet.

He says she’ll have to show herself eventually. (I’m adding the gender because I’m assuming they’re talking about Mom, but they don’t specify at all, so it’s possible they mean someone or something else.) Hades gets impatient. He blames Jade Emperor for breaking the rules in the first place: “I said we should throw her in hell!”

Hm, did Mom get a free pass from the Jade Emperor once upon a time? This must be why he apologized for his part in all this, if it was his mercy that led to centuries of mayhem.

Hades reinforces his stance, that they follow rules for a reason. Jade Emperor says that the grave has been uncovered, and Arang’s identity known, so she’ll be targeted next. Hades tsk-tsks his brother’s concern over mortals, and says at least it’ll mean fewer needless deaths for the time being.

Joo-wal is still kneeling before Mom, in the same position all night and day. She finally smiles and says that they’ll have to keep Arang alive: “Keep her close.”

Okay, that’s creepier. I’d rather you guys just try to kill her. She tells him to keep Arang and the magistrate alive for now, and to find out what it is she wants most. Joo-wal doesn’t understand why.

She lifts the veil and motions for him to come close. He sits in front of her, shaking, and she caresses his face, “Did it hurt a lot?” So. Creepy. It’s so much worse when you’re being nice and momlike!

She leans in close and whispers in his ear, “No matter what anyone says, you are the most precious thing I have, my son.” Dude, she is so playing him like a fiddle. I mean, obviously, he fears her, but she lures him with what he really wants—love. So wrong. So, so very wrong.

She sends him away with his new task, and then goes down into her secret underground lair. Another creepy altar, this one with two jars. She caresses them and says the time has come for them to come out—she doesn’t trust humans, and “You’re the only ones who can protect me.”

She releases the black demon energy… and two reapers appear before her. Wait, were they reapers you trapped, or reapers you made? And can she do that?

She tells them that she was worried when her seal broke, but then she discovered Arang. “I knew that something like her might exist…” she relishes the thought of having her, and never needing a disgusting human being ever again.

Oh my gaaaaaah. YOU SENT ARANG DOWN AS BAIT?! You mean old fogey! Is that what she is?

Lord Choi finally wakes up feeling better, and his servant comes back after doing his background check on Eun-oh. So, is he the powerful Lord Kim’s son, as they say?

The news makes Lord Choi happy: Eun-oh isn’t a legitimate son, but the son of a concubine, a slave woman who was the daughter of a traitor no less. But Lord Kim hides this fact for reasons unknown, and lets people believe he’s a legitimate son.

What’s more is that he found Eun-oh’s reason for coming to Miryang. But Lord Choi doesn’t even let him finish because he’s cackling at Eun-oh’s illegitimacy and hatching a plan. He tells him to gather up some strong men.

Joo-wal goes looking for the magistrate, but the Bangs tell him he’s dead. He asks about the girl and they realize they haven’t seen her either. Things aren’t looking up for you.

But then Dol-swe bursts in with a bloody Eun-oh on his back, and the Bangs gaaaaasp. Is he… alive? Dol-swe yells at them to send someone down to the river too, because Arang fell.

We see her body wash ashore, and the bones in her broken arm reset themselves. *shudder*

The Bangs continue their round of I didn’t kill him! and Yes! Keep saying that! Their faces fall at the news from the doctor: Eun-oh lost a lot of blood, but he’ll be okay.

Dol-swe wails and wails by master’s bedside, and Eun-oh wakes long enough to gasp, “A…rang!” But Dol-swe just collapses on his chest like a puddle, crying that he’s right here.

Thankfully Joo-wal has a reason to find Arang and keep her alive, and goes searching for her.

He finds her lying on the riverbank, and approaches warily, remembering the way her corpse looked after he stabbed her.

He checks and she’s breathing. He looks up at the cliff—how could she be alive?

He holds her up, and she comes to. She recognizes him and wonders if he’s real, touching his face to see. It feels warm and she says he must be real. “Not a dream.”

She asks how he found her and he says he just happened by. She thanks him and gets up to go. She falters and he runs to catch her, and she says she’s okay and keeps going.

He runs after her and scoops her up in his arms and carries her to his horse. Omo. Is the bad guy allowed to be this swoony? So confusing!

As they ride away she leans back and falls asleep on his shoulder. Eerily like when you killed her and rode off with her corpse…

And the love triangle begins. But what a great triangle—’cause one of them is a freaking murderer! Talk about adding a twist to a common trope. Why have a daddy long legs sap as a second lead when you can have a minion of even-the-gods-don’t-know-what? Hellspawn is definitely way more exciting as romantic competition. Even though… I guess technically… Eun-oh is her actual spawn… eeep! But playing the triangle for the life-and-death tension is far more interesting and adds a great layer to every interaction. I’m looking forward to Arang swooning over Joo-wal, making Eun-oh jealous, and then Eun-oh getting to say his big I told you so! when Joo-wal tries to kill her again. It’s suspense AND comedy! I love it.

I guess Mom isn’t exactly your average demon, soul-sucker, or shaman on a power binge, because if she can create evil… that’s another realm entirely. I guess they’re taking her Mother of All metaphor all the way. I’m curious to know how this demon business works, because you’d think that Hades would have a better grip on the evil spirits in the world. But she’s sort of trapping souls that ought to move on and letting them fester and twist, until they lose themselves and become something unrecognizable. So were her two jar-reapers once agents of Mu-young who got trapped and festered for centuries? Because reapers are scary enough as they are, but two crazy ones? And I’m worried for Mu-young; if Mom turns out to be his sister, then what?

It’s seeming more and more that whatever they made Arang into was purposefully something that Mom would covet—either as a source of life, power, or both. I’m curious to know if “that child” the kings keep talking about is really Arang (and she has some sort of supernatural power she has yet to uncover), or if they’re actually talking about Eun-oh. We have yet to have any direct reference to Eun-oh from them, but if he really is Mom’s bloodline, they must know who he is. Is Arang the key as we’ve been led to believe, or is it actually Eun-oh? I assumed it was Arang, until Eun-oh broke the seal that ended up being a giant supernatural dam that unleashed a horde of unknown demonic beings. (I guess that’s the upside-downside: you weaken the Big Bad, but you unleash hell on earth as a side effect.) But the interesting thing is that Eun-oh was the agent of that change… so is he the weapon?

I do like the clever reason to unleash a panoply of odd creatures into their world, which means loads of fun and interesting bad guys for them to fight, and hopefully each of them brings another piece of the puzzle along with them. So far we know that Arang’s got organs like a newborn and lacks body heat, even though she feels human. And her ability to regenerate (besides creeping me out on a regular basis) suddenly makes her Target Number One. Damn, can’t a girl just enjoy her humanness for like a day? She breaks my heart every time she insists that she’s a person, because she screams it louder as she believes it less. What’s great about her conflict is that the circumstances are crazy and outlandish, but her angst is so simple and primal. She just wants to be alive. What simpler thing could anyone ask for in this world?

Omg, how could they make my favorite magistrate all bloodied and in pain. But I guess it is more painful for Arang to know that she not exactly a human after all. I really creeped out when Worst Mom get close to Joowal. I thought that she wanted some ki-sharing-session with him. Yuck!!

The writing is so strong with this drama. It’s rare to find a character like Joowal, whom I view with disgust and pity, in an Asian drama – usually people are so black and white. I wonder if he will fall for Arang because watching him struggle from Mom’s grasp out of love for somebody else will be fantastic.

Lol this is so inappropriate of me, but I totally swooned when Joo-wal swept Arang off her feet and carried her.

Oh, If K-dramas were a large box of candies, this one would be that rare delicious treat that I dig up the whole box of goodies for. *Sigh* the soundtrack, characters, plot, special effects, directing, and just everything <3

I think it’s extra creepy how swoony that scene was. I mean, yeah, he’s got some feelings there, and she thinks he’s the hero of the ghost damsel in distress, but he also KILLED her! Is there such a thing as swoony shivers? Because that’s what I got watching that.

I swooned too! It is probably the first heroic thing he’s done in this series and it really looked like he swept her off her feet because she was thisclose to passing out rather than him needing to get close to her.

Part of it is also because I was sad that Arang has to wake up from death alone again. Eun-oh passed out and it was apparent to Dol-swe that Arang was dead and would stay dead. I was mad at Dol-swe for leaving her body behind and not even feeling a smidgeon of pity for dead Arang, but really what else could he do?

Awesome to have a good-looking guy be there when you come back from the dead. And it would have sucked to walk all the way back home on foot after dying.

Initially, I found Dol Swe’s “oh well” response at Arang falling off the cliff to be heartless. If she weren’t a mystical being, Arang would have been dead. Being jealous of her is one thing, but what was with the apathetic reaction? I thought it was out of character because Dol Swe is not inherently evil. But then on re-watch, I wasn’t as bothered plus he did send for help…

This drama is really good and doesn’t linger much in the romance, but delves more into the plot and mystery. i think that’s why other viewers are not enjoying it as much as others do, since they watched it for a sappy love story between a ghost and a human. wooh

I’m hoping Jo-wal and Arang will have their romance time, and jo-wal will experience , love and trust without conditions from Arang. And then, JW can differentiate the evil mom’s affection to Arang’s affection to him and in the end JW will betray the evil mom . He will sacrifice his life to save and put everything in order for the sake of his love to ARANG!

nice but not gonna ship it cos it’ll be tragic.. Otoh, i actually hope DS will have a loveline w BW just becos they look cute together.. DS need a girl so he wont be too fixated on his young master, lol..

tragic, Yes but justified! With all those pure soul girls JW brought to death, one death is not enough, he should die many times over, but if he dies with a noble act , a death that will put this evil end then i’d use this tragic end. At least , a villain turned hero is what will be forever remembered of him!

Yep, this is exactly what I predict Joo-wal’s character trajectory will be. It hasn’t even happened yet but I’m already feeling the tragic angst just imagining it. *sigh* I think one of the most evil things Mom ever did was twisting and corrupting a desperate child like Joo-wal. By now he’s procured too many people for Mom, knowingly; there can be no redemption unless he sacrifices his life to take her down.

I love that the writers have given us such a compelling character to become invested in, but I just know that I’ll be sobbing my eyes out by the end of the drama because of him.

i think the translation for “bu-in” is not as direct as “wife”. In Mandarin Chinese, we sometimes use the term for “wife” in a more respectful sense to someone who is not our wife, like….”madame” (but that usage was more prevalent a long long time ago; few still do that now). I figured it has the same meaning here, considering that this IS a saguek, and there’s no way that Joo-wal can be married to Mom, and obviously he fears her, everything adds up if we translate “bu-in” as “madame”, no?

I think Joo-wal has been earmarked to be Mom’s future husband. I’m guessing that when Joo-Wal and Lee Seo Rim got married (they were engaged, remember), Mom will take over her body and continue her evil deeds as the new Lady Choi. Unfortunately for the baddies, LSR died and they couldn’t find her body. Since Arang has an “immortal” body, Mom is overjoyed at the prospect of “never needing a disgusting human being again”.

The thing is that when Arang took the hairpin out her hairdo was how Eun-Oh’s seen her before.So… I really can’t think of a definite explanation… she just wandered out in the world for a while and now she’s hiding in just one place? Why just now and not before?

That’s what I thought too! If the “mom” was the 400 year old problem that the Jade Emperor kept on talking about, then Eun-oh’s mom was just a victim of circumstances. If she had thoughts of revenge or anything negative, this might have made her vulnerable for her body to be possessed by that “evil thing”.

this just get more exciting and more supernatural. i love how the show is adding more supernatural themes and it makes sense. and what more creepy is the idea of ghost being left behind to fester and get twisted up. thats disturbing in all sorts of ways. poor eun oh, getting all hurt like that. but i wonder like you who the emperor is talking about as “the child”.

ok usually i never like the second male lead, who happens to be a bad guy as a love interest with the female lead. but holy cow… i just can’t help but not like joo wol and hate him at the same time. i know that arang and eun oh will fall in love and may or may not end up with each other, but never the less love each other, but the chemistry between arang and joo wol is so great. maybe its that bad boy effect. that he may change his ways or slightly become better because of arang. its always quite sad for me when the bad boy falls in love with the girl he can’t have especially if he has had such a twisted life. i love the second male lead which is usual considering his a murderer

i love this love triangle and the mysteries that have been put forth. this show is all kinds of awesomeness. and quite unpredictable.

i love this drama..i really do…
i love both lead…love the heavenly graphic,the story but idk..
why…. their story kinda missing the romance scene like in episode 2,the hanbok measure scene,such a good scene..but that it..
argghhhh…..please..i want my hot sizzling chemistry couple back

your right there.,. a lot of people just love the show because of the romance.,. I love the mystery lies in this drama.,. Our life is not always full of romance but a mystery that needs to be unravel like this drama.,.

Agree that the drop is to be expected. The Korean viewers will watch Gaksital first and then watch Arang’s re-run. Hopefully, the ratings won’t decline further on Thursday when Gaksital’s final episode is aired.

At least someone who feels like me: That episode was a total bore! Both leads waking up/coughing/talking/fainting again in a cave for half an hour. ??? There is a writing/dialogues problem also: Arang saying she needs to catch the ghoul when he has just been captured by the grim reaper in front of her. ?????
I believe the typhoon in SK messed with the shooting. But again, they should have a few episodes in the box yet it feels like improvising. I have a bad feeling about this…

OMG!! i’m shock upon seeing bloody Eun-oh. so much thank you for the recap. starting this week i prefer read the recap first then watch the drama. it’s more excited this way rather than watch the drama first then read the recap. lol.

Oh the beginnings of the love triangle. All of her interactions with him will have me going “Don’t like him dammit he’s killed you, most likely twice!!!” but it’ll be good fun.
With every episode we get deeper into this mystery and i love it. I like how they don’t have everything unraveling at once, but slowly. It gives time for us to theorize and try to make sense of the clues we’re given. Great mystery show!
Eun-oh/ Arang interactions were cute. Dol-swe is as petty and lovable as ever. And my interest in Joo-wal grows. I wonder what path the boy will take. Still hate all he’s done though.
I love this show so much 😀 it’s very enjoyable. I haven’t been this immersed in a fantasy world in a long time.

FYI…. liver is the only part of the human body that can regenerate like that of the starfish….so literally you can cut a liver and it grows back to its original size. hair and nails is not considered coz the part you cut (tip) is dead already having no blood flowing.

@Kiara
i know. i could understand if it was wayyyyyy back in the distance but cmon you can miss it. it really messed with me. the image of some guy changing a light blub in the cave was all i could think about

@jomo
yea i was like wait why are they running away from the ladder? then it hit me. i wonder if the dvd version of this will still have the ladder

I figure the show ratings went down because people are tuning in to Gaksital in it’s final stretch(27 was SO good!) and those that left because they wanted a tragic love story between ghost and man more than complex mystery. Which is sad but true. I worry for the ratings because Nice Guy is coming out and I feel like it’s going to capture a lot of viewers too, just like Gaksital. I can’t fault those watching Gaksital because i honestly would too. Final stretch and it’s been consistently amazing! And Nice Guys is premiering so of course many people want to get a feel for it.
Gotta wait and see. I just don’t like gems like this not getting proper recognition.

I’m crying and my heart felt a lot of pain watching Eun Ho and Arang during the scenes she fall down. I fell for Arang especially. What she has to endure is not what we have endure. The pain. The confusion. The multipale feeling and emotion of falling on death. Oh my. We never encounter the door of death so we never know.

so, jo wal. I’m like a cave woman. Big strong hottie shows off his protective strength.
At the same time, he is likely a serial killer. So that kills it two seconds after I enjoyed it. Puns.

And this had to happen because ljk’s char was getting too complacent that he could be an ass to cover his feelings every time, ha! And we know his growth (and reluctance) of becoming an emotional human being must run along side Arang’s need to physically be one. So let them push each other along that route….just don’t over angst. But I have faith in you, Show.

beautifully said. Yah. I feel that about Eun Oh too. He has to stop being harsh and unintentionally/intentionally being insensitive towards Arang. I think he better stop now or they will drift apart in terms of emotionally.

I love how Eun-oh is starting to really care for Arang. The recap here didn’t fully capture it, but I loved how, when she was climbing back up the soon-to-break rope, he told her to take a deep breath and think a happy memory and then it’ll be over soon. I thought that was a really powerful and emotional development between the two–he’s come a long way since that night when he tried to drag her back out to the scene where she died against her will, claiming that she would revive anyhow.

Love this development! But, ARGH, for the Joo-wal and his damned “white-knightness.”

This drama just keeps leaving me with more and more questions…the biggest one being “WHAT ARE THEY?” And that one pretty much applies to everyone. Every character is like secret mystical being that we don’t understand. So crazy. And sweet Arang who just wants to be a person. I really really wish they’d stop killing her. It makes my heart hurt.

And your last line is AWESOME, GF. And so true. Eun Oh better get in gear cause the black knight is white knighting his girl!

Thanks for the recap, girlfriday! I thought this episode was a big draggy compared to the previous 6, but a slightly draggy Arang episode is still heck loads better than some entire dramas out there.

I also thought that it would be a viable option for Arang to jump off the cliff, kill herself, and get resurrected so she could get help. Then thought that was a horrible and insensitive idea, given how Arang said dying was scary. Then Eun-oh voiced it! Good thing he was only joking!

I wonder if there is a reason why Eun-oh’s dad practically claimed him as a legitimate son. Maybe he couldn’t have any more sons? I can buy that he would do so even if Eun-oh’s mom is a slave, but Eun-oh being the grandson of a supposed traitor, sort of makes it surprising. Just randomly speculating that his dad may actually be significant and show his face in the series.

the cave demon was so freaky! When Arang was wandering through the cave alone, I was thinking well, she’s been a ghost before so no need to fear ghosts in cave for Arang. No need to fear reapers for now because she’s “alive”. And her enemies, Evil Mom and Joo-wol, are still back in town. Man, didn’t expect a crazy demon!

Okay so I have to say this and I bite my tongue while I say it cause I said something along the lines of ..”which faith had the PD from Arang,” Today’s episode lack production quality and big time… the musicalization was sort of off, the editing was choppy, the camera work was jerky at points, specially that scene with evil-something-mom in the cave.. And OMGGGGGGGGGG I’m still cringing over the shot of the collapsing cave passage where you can clearly see the freaking ladder, cause dude really? really?!!!

On the story front yeiii for the love triangle between the sad eyed murder, the girl who isn’t a ghost or a human and the Sato who is half mystical/ evil creature….. the episodes before this one had been really low on the romance department so its nice to see the story working that side too.

I have a question though.. if Dol So says he made a promise to EO’s maternal grandfather, what the hell is said grandfather? was he like a puppet of evil lady and she pretended being his daughter or he her father for real? Wouldn’t that make DS like 400 years old? I think right now I’m more interested in EO’s possible family three than what the heck Arang became…

I’m loving this drama. Usually with a drama you generally know how the story will unfold so there are few surprises but this drama is the complete opposite for me. The story just keeps surprising me and I love not knowing where it will go next. The writer definitely seems to have a great handle on the world created and seems to have everything planned in advance.

Arang and Joowal, I feel like I have a handle on what there story is, even though I know there’s probably plenty still to be revealed. Eun -oh on the other hand still feels very mysterious to me. This episode left me with even more questions about him then before. I want to know more about his family. If he’s the one the gods are talking about as the ultimate weapon? I want to know more about the life he lead before meeting Arang. Why can he see ghosts and does his mom know that he inherited some supernatural abilities from her? My head is filled with theories but I know I probably won’t even be close to what the story actually is. And I really love that.

Am also wondering about Eun-Oh’s family history, and why he’s so hung up over mom.

But I think a better question would be, what IS mom? Is she really his mom — did she actually gjve birth to him, or did a she-demon just took in her appearance or took possession of her body? Is she really a slave-concubine? Did she perhaps struck a bargain with the evil-powers-that-be to exact vengeance on Flower Boy Jade King for the slaughter of her entire family? But Jade King and Hades discussed something about how the rift in the spirit world started out some four-hundred years back, so am thinking monster mom has been carrying out her evil agenda half-a-millenia ago.

But if she really is a powerful she-demon that could churn out her own minion of other-worldly beings, why spend time at all as a lowly servant to be knocked up by a horny noble-lord, and why give up Eun Ho and adopt Joo Wol instead? Wouldn’t it fit in more with her plans if she made use of Eun Ho’s dashing good-looks and his mama’s boy tendencies to procure those virgin souls for her?

Eun-oh really is a big question mark. There’s got to be a reason why Dolswe has mentioned more than once his maternal grandfather.. and that promise. Why would the grandfather make Dolswe promise to take care of Eun-oh? Just a normal deathbed wish or did he know something was up?

I love his character’s development so far though. He’s learning to care for someone truly, what with wanting to run to Arang after she fell off the cliff although he was in such a bad state. Like he didn’t want her to wake up alone even though he’s sure she wouldn’t die. Can’t wait for him to take his insensitive i-don’t-ever-say-sorry shell off!

This show’s running theme on what it MEANS to BE human is so so much love – Arang’s desires, Evil Mom’s twisted lost souls, and even among the real living humans, from Joowal’s sad beggar past to murderer present, to Eun-oh’s character and also non-noble status… Ah<3

…part of me really dislikes that Super-Bad might be Moo-Young’s missing sister — in any incarnation. The actress is playing her in such a creeptastic way, I would find it very hard to *feel* anything but disturbed by her from here on out.

I was kinda hoping the missing sister was a random soul-trapped-village-girl that Moo-Young would eventually free and subsequently have a loving final parting.

If it turns out that Moo-young is *technically* Eun-oh’s uncle throught demon-morphing, then you can add another kdrama trope (birth secret) to the twisted pile.

When Mu Young said something about “losing yourself”, well, isn’t that what’s happened or started to happen to Arang? She doesn’t know who she is.

Maybe Mom “ate” Arang’s soul but Mu Young was able to find her soul wandering around instead of being twisted by Mom’s evil evil jars of twistiness. So Arang just lost her identity but didn’t morph into Liver-Eater.

No — monster mom couldn’t have eaten Arang’s soul because Arang’s soul has been wandering around as a lost ghost from the day she died, three years before.

Contrast that with a ghoul, whose soul has been trapped inside itself, thereby twisting itself into evilness, as you say.

There IS something about Arang, though what that is we still couldn’t say. I mean, even before she was Arang Re-born, her body as Lee Seo Rim never decomposed. I mean, what’s up with that? And why hasn’t it been addressed in the show? A corpse shows up after it’s been left rotting for 3 years and it’s … well, not. Rotting, that is.

Also, I don’t think Arang was one of the souls monster mom tried to “ferment.” She doesn’t seem to be aware of Arang’s existence until this episode, but she seems to know precisely what she is. I used to think Arang might be one of the virgin souls Joo Wol tried to offer up to her three years back, and that Arang managed to escape from that shack with that creepy bloody altar, but died from her knife wound to the belly somewhere down the river along the way.

But then you’d think Joo Wol would recognize her. But then if you’re chopping up virgin brides to satisfy mom’s munchies maybe you wouldn’t look too closely?

And you’re right — Moo Young’s comment about evil spirits starting out as souls that simply lost its sense of self and identity clearly affected Arang. It’s a wise and perceptive comment, applicable not only to ghosts but human beings as well. It’s top notch writing, that.

Am absolutely loving this show. I thought I’d prefer it over Faith, because of LMH, but that’s starting to get lamer and lamer every ep, mostly because I couldn’t stand the lead girl they tapped in for the series. She’s in her thirties and still acts like a fan girl for Justin Bieber. Give me Shin Min Ah every time.

– Mom killed Arang the first time
– Arang (or at least her soul) escaped either by luck or with Hot Young Jade Emperor’s sneaky sneaky helping ways
– Arang lost her self/memory the 1st time she died but was not able to complete the fermentation thing because she escaped
– She got picked up by Mu Young and escaped *again* with HYJE’s help
– Whatever is weird with Arang is HYJE’s fault due to their bet (ie he turned Arang into bait)
– Mom was not interested in Arang before this, thus, she did not remember eating/trying to eat her in the past; given that she’s eaten a lot of people and a single girl doesn’t make a difference

Finally, the reason why HYJE turned Arang into bait is because he knew that she’s an escaped fermentee, and perhaps has a level of immunity from Mom’s ways, given that Arang has no more “self” to lose.

So it was Mom’s failed 1st attempt to kill Arang that rendered her “invincible” for now. She’s the one soul Mom won’t be able to steal a “soul” from. And the HYJE capitalized on that by giving Arang an “immortal and fresh/baby body”, thus turning her into Mom bait whereas Mom doesn’t know that there’s nothing left to steal from Arang.

It’s kind of like Harry Potter that way. Except Dumbledore is hot and cheeky in this version. :))

But if monster mom did try to eat and ferment Arang the first time around and she managed to escape in the manner in which you said, you really don’t think mom would remember that? She doesn’t seem to be too forgiving of failure — her harsh treatment of Joo Wal when Arang escaped from death-shack-in-the-woods in ep 5 is a testament to that. Also, that seems to be the first time Joo Wal failed to deliver a virgin / pure soul for mom to munch on, as mom didn’t point out any failed deliveries in the past. But it’s nice to speculate what happened and who’s what and what’s what. Can’t wait for the rest of the eps to come out, and if any of the theories you’d pointed out would bear out. They’re all quite interesting. 🙂

1.) 400 years ago (in the middle of the Joseon era, according to
1st ep), something catastrophic occurred which resulted in
the breakdown of the barriers between the mortal plane and the
next-world plane, allowing lost souls to wander around
on earth instead of moving on to the next. My guess is demon mom managed
to escape from hell by blowing up said barrier. The Jade King and
Hades has been trying to repair the rift ever since, and the only means to
build the barrier back up is throwing said escapee’s ass back to hell.

2.) Eun Ho is the chief means the gods had devised to do so.
I mean you have grim reapers to drag the dead to the underworld,
makes sense to have ghost-whispering Eun Ho drag mom’s ass back
to where she escaped from.

3.) Demon escapee needed fresh, virgin souls to keep her body in
the mortal plane, and a host body to walk around in. Enter Arang
(when she was still Lee Seo Rim) as the virgin soul to be
sacrificed, and Eun Ho’s mom (before she was monster mom) as the
host body-suit. This is why both disappeared at about the same
time — I’d say exactly the same time, and both were brought
to the death-shack-in-the-woods to undergo whatever ceremony
is needed to effect the change. In trying to save her own life, Arang (as
Lee Seo Rim) grabbed Eun Ho’s mom’s hair pin as a weapon, managed
to escape, but died somewhere down the river. No problem: all
monster mom needed to do is hunt down another virgin soul. Eun Ho’s
mom didn’t escape (or maybe she was a willing host?) and that’s why
monster mom is walking around looking like Eun Ho’s mom. Because Arang’s
soul wasn’t sealed inside her body, she rose out of her body to wander
around as a lost ghost for the past 3 years.

3.1) Arang / Lee Seo Rim has always been and was born an “immortal being,”
which is why her body never decomposed, and why, even
as a ghost, she was not a “pale” ghost — she still has
the same coloring she did when she was still alive.
Contrast that with all the other ghosts we’ve seen
in the series: pale skin, pale lips, hollow eyes ….

3.2) Ghost-whispering Eun Ho is the hunter for monster mom;
Arang will be the rabbit-bait to flush out monster mom.

3.3.) Still no idea how and why Arang lost her memory, other
than it makes for a better story.

3.4) When Joo Wal killed Arang in ep 5, he managed to seal in
her soul inside her body, which is why Arang was able
to revive in her own body, and didn’t rise out of it
like white steam to wander around as a lost ghost like
she did in the beginning of the series. And her soul
still remained sealed inside her body, which is why
she’ll just keep reviving in her own body throughout
the length of the series, I would think.

4.) From what I can tell so far, monster mom needed two types of souls
to carry out her own agenda:

4.1.) One: the pure virgin souls which she consumes to keep herself
young, alive, and within the mortal plane;

4.2.) Two: twisted, evil souls (like the murderer-for-hire in ep. 8)
which she ferments in clay jars to serve as her minion
at the proper time. This is why the mother who sacrificed
her life to save her daughter in ep. 8 were promptly dispatched
by the faux grim-reapers: she serves no serviceable
purpose in evil mom’s agenda, since she is neither evil nor a
virgin soul.

Fudge! Why is Arang and the Magistrate freaking me out so much?! I knew that man would be crazy. I was pleading, please do not be the mom in disguise… please do not be the mom in disguise… But a schizophrenic!? Who eats livers!? Then turns out to be a ghoul!? Why was Arang not fighting back? That is so unlike her. And why am I watching this at night? =_=

I LOVED Jun Ki in the ledge scene where Eun Oh saved Arang twice — first from falling, then from jumping. Still sharp as a knife whilst on the verge of death. Cool as a cucumber as Arang was hysterical. *_*

Throw in some swooning for Joo Wal also. So hot when he swooped Arang up in his arms. Why am I so taken by a murderer? If Mom is omniscient, how come she can’t sense it’s her own son doing all this probing?

“I LOVED Jun Ki in the ledge scene where Eun Oh saved Arang twice — first from falling, then from jumping. Still sharp as a knife whilst on the verge of death. Cool as a cucumber as Arang was hysterical. *_*”

ARANG–Everyone wants her even baddies are going to take care of —keeping Her Alive….But poor Dol wee….afraid of losing his master.This drama with many Cryptic clues…not exactly describing about the character whom they are taking about…Who are to come in next episode???
That evil creepy mom of Eun & sister of mu young is she that powerful than both Heaven&hell emperor….And yes if they are to do it directly there would be no need of all this episodes…..
And i guess coming eps are more creepy,mystic and also jealousness of Eun is to follow..
Thanks for recap

On a plot level, I’m a bit puzzled as to why Joowal and Arang don’t recognise each other from before. Didn’t she see him when her heart went all pit-a-pat, prompting her to ask for new clothes? (Or did she only get a glimpse of his side profile?)

As for Joowal, he should have recognized Arang’s face even before his ring turned red — she *was* his fiancee and he did tell Eun Oh he’d seen her at least once… that’s assuming for now he didn’t kill Seo Rim, since her body wasn’t in the bonepit.

I believe Arang’s doki-doki’s heart when she saw JW for the first time is not a labu labu (love-love) one. Instead it is a fear attack that Arang couldn’t differentiate of. She just couldn’t explain the feeling.

I think when her heart went pit-a-pat, she may have not seen his face. She had seen him pretty far away. I think the idea of a rich, elegant prince-like young man had her nervous. I may be wrong, but I think she thinks the fiance and the guy who helped her over the wall may be different guys. When she bumped into him on the way to her funeral, she asked him for directions to the funeral and he couldn’t answer. She would have known by this episode that he didn’t go to Lee Seo-rim’s funeral (she had asked Eun-oh if the fiance attended the funeral) because the young man she bumped into didn’t know the way.

I think there may be something magical going on that prevents people except Eun-oh from recognizing her. All those people who had seen Arang’s corpse when her body was discovered didn’t make the connection either.